All Forum Posts by: Kareem Lyons

Teams can be a great way to learn the business.  If you are not good at lead generation and prospecting, then even more so a team is likely a way to go. 

You mention you work 15 to 20 hours a week....thats what I spend on lead generation alone.  Lead generation for a solo agent needs to be their #1 activity.

Kareem Lyons it’s a good start. Now you just have to do that 5-6 days a week every day for likely several months. Direct mail has a 1 percent conversion rate if you’re lucky so probably assume something similar in all of this.

For following up I wouldn’t overthink it. Just call them back a week or so later and just repeat a version of what you said the first time.

I can’t speak for everyone but when people leave stuff on my door step or in the handle I usually just toss it. I’d probably be more in favor of mailing a postcard to the places you door knock.

Kareem:

I started my real estate career in 1978 when I was 24. I have had a long and successful career in the highly competitive market in Silicon Valley and the San Francisco Peninsula.

#1 Email and social media are lower priorities. Do not start your day with those activities. They suck time and give the illusion of meaningful activity.

#2 Work your social sphere - this is highest priority - above all others.

#3 This means getting face to face or voice to voice with your friends family and associates. Email does not cut it.

Let them know you need help and are looking for clients. Your social sphere will want you to succeed and will help you do so.

Let them know, no deal is too small - rentals OK etc. How can you help them? Talk about the market. People always what to do what the house around the corner sold for.

#4 Do as many open houses as you can. You again need to get face to face with people. I would suggest low end properties - first time buyer properties. First time buyers are less likely to have a prior relationship with an agent. Get to know that market inside and out.

#5 Contact experienced and busy agents in your office and ask for referrals. Every long term agent has buyers they don't have time for. These may be low quality referrals - after all why would an agent give you a high quality referral? But something is better than nothing. These people may waste your time - but better to be out in the market meeting buyers showing houses than looking at your computer.

#6 Real estate sales is like an airplane taking off. The plane needs maximum power and effort to get into the air but once at flying altitude, the engines are cut back and the plane coasts.

Your RE career has not taken off, you need to reach maximum energy doing productive activities to take off. Once
you get a few sales under your belt, you will be off and running.

Focus face to face voice to voice.
Contact every one you know.
5 to 10 "live" contacts a day.
Work open houses.

Good luck, hope this helps a little.

Arn

A lot of great advice so won’t go too much into action plans because it’s already been mentioned. One item you mentioned that is concerning is you said you did 200-300 letters to handout and you gained one contact but you lost track of. That’s this business. I’m 4 1/2 years in and just listed my first $950,000 property then leveraged that listing to receive a $1,650,000 listing going up in around 7-10 days. You can’t “lose” contact. The grind is for the prospects then converting those prospects to clients. Then serving those people at such a high level of service that they will refer you. It sounds like your letters potentially were a success then you lost contact literally or just over time. There may have been xxxx amount of other people that you didn’t consider a success that you “lost contact” with as well, or just never attempted to reconnect with.

Ah heck I’ll throw in a little advice I can’t help myself. I usually do the personal notes after a good contact and I always attempt to follow it up with a plan of action then stick to it. Hold an open house and have a great conversation with a potential buyer that readily leaves their information behind? Write a personal note thanking for stopping in and how much you enjoyed the conversation. Only say it if it’s genuine. Say you enjoyed it so much you were going to reach out on say Thursday/Friday. Give it enough time that the letter will show up. Follow through with calls. It’s all a layering effect though. If you’re not going to make it financially but you still have the fire. Go join one of these super teams and let them feed you leads. You’ll work like a dog and they’ll take a pretty penny from your commission split but you won’t have to lead generate to gain experience. My personal advice if you can is to rough it out though. Yes you’ll gain experience but mainly lead generation is a lot of times the only difference between an agent with a team of 50 and the agent that can’t make it.

Also maybe don’t try to define your business yet if you’re doing so. When I first got in there was tons of agents that immediately went for the luxury market or primarily flippers etc. Hardly anyone I joined with is still in real estate. I took anything I could get. Then focused on value for my clients, honing my skills etc. Now I have a couple of assistants and I’m slowly positioning myself for the luxury market but not because that’s really what I want but because my goals are value it’s difficult to offer value at 75-100 transactions a year but you can do at 15-25 a year. So for me I can bring gifts to listing presentations and send little pop bys that aren’t just silly notes on skittles because I’m focusing in on a smaller number of transactions.

Learn tools to lead generate. Door knocking, expired listings, open houses, join a BNI Group or a networking group, see if your company has a relocation division. Don’t focus on a specific niche, focus on just improving your craft and make no doubts your craft/skill is lead generation right now. That’s it. Then find your niche. Mine was construction. I had experience working on homes for years. I focused on a more detailed market analysis, being more knowledgeable on homes and prices of materials/installation costs within the homes and used that to position me as a pro in negotiations and setting higher prices for listings and being able to make strong arguments for those prices. Last part is as you’re lead generating make sure you’re following up with those prospects. Start your day lead generating, then everyday near the end call past potential clients for an hour. See what’s changed. Maybe too early to jump into a CRM but just use an excel sheet to save what they’ve been doing or how far out they are.

I was an agent for several years before becoming an investor. If I could do it all over again I would take @Ryan Evans advice and knock on doors. I honestly think it is a lot harder to land sellers as many of them already have relationships with other realtors through one avenue or another. I would go to high end apartment complexes with business cards. My script would sound something like, "Hi, I'm @Kareem Lyons with Weichert Realtors and I see you have great taste in this high end apartment. I want to get you into your first home, I have a lender I know that can get you approved today so we can go find you something. Let's give this guy a call right now."

P.S. I also sold industrial maintenance products face to face to decision makers at businesses and on about every business I went to there is a sign that says "No soliciting." If I read signs I would have made no money. Instead, I'd walk around to the back door and start making my way to the boss man's office. To make money in face to face sales you have to be stray cat. Just knock on doors until someone feeds you, and keep checking back with them until they feed you again.

Kareem, 

My wife and I have been in real estate for 7 years now. It was impossibly difficult in the beginning. I remember thinking that we'd never make it work. But here we are, 7 years later. It sounds to me like you're looking to grow your real estate sales business. 

I'm going to tell you three things that I wish someone would have told me when i started. 

1) Read the book; Millionaire Real Estate Agent ($25)

2) Take the course: Peak Producers ($500)

3) Join a networking group (Free)

Start there. Make the investment in yourself. You can do this.  You go this. 

I didn't read all of this.

Figure out your (burn rate). Basically if you cut all expenses as low as possible what do you need to live for the basics?

If credit score is low then work on getting credit score higher to then be able to borrow money if needed at lower interest rates. I get zero interest same as cash on many items. I could pay cash but why when zero interest and small monthly payment.

Look at expenses and separate wants from needs. Example you need food to live but do not need to go out to eat or go to movie theater if money is not there.

Have you thought of sitting a subdivision for a home builder? You stay there all day and sell just a few models to buyers coming by. This versus only being able to usually take out one set of buyers at a time and they all want the weekends to look.

When starting out as a new agent it is tough. Nobody wants to work with the new agent most times because they feel they do not have enough knowledge yet to effectively help them from making big mistakes with the purchase process. So you get lot's of thanks and oh that is great you are in the business but not many takers as clients. Practice your presentation. Study and analyze every day to improve how you come across to potential clients. It can be great to video record yourself and role play with your broker or other colleagues. Make sure you are in the  profession for the right reasons.

15 years ago I never will forget the broker teaching the license course telling us. "Take care of people FIRST from a place of authenticity and the money will start taking care of itself". If you work to be passionate and knowledgeable potential clients feed off of that. If they think you are (just in it for the money) and a (quick check) to them they pick up on that also. It is hard when you have little to no money starting out to not appear desperate for a deal to happen. Over time when deals build up and you become flush with cash then you have an authentic aura that  can exude you are an expert and confident in what you do.

I had lean years starting out as every new agent does. 

Very few ever make it. In commercial real estate I do very well. I have  a goal to read 1 million pages of material over my lifetime for fun. I log the books read etc. with an excel file and keep count.

Most brokerages figure new agents will make a few sales the first year before going out. They run agent mills to make 50% cut and train them up knowing few will ever make it long term.

Hopefully you are one of the 10% that makes it.